This invention relates to portable radios and more particularly to a battery charger for a portable radio having a battery pack.
Portable radios of the type used for two-way communication are in common use today and are generally provided with a battery pack or compartment forming an integral unit to eliminate the need for power conductors for connection to an external source of power. Such present day battery packs permit the operation of the radio for a limited period of time at the desired power level following which the power output of the battery is weakened or reduced limiting the effectiveness of the radio. Therefore, it is a common practice to provide rechargeable batteries for such portable radios so that the radio-battery unit may be placed in a suitable charger connected to a source of power for recharging the battery back to full power.
A wide variety of such radio-battery units are produced today which are characterized mainly by not only radios of different lengths, but also battery packs which vary in capacity and therefore in length. One such radio- battery unit is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,644,873. Such variations in these radio-battery units present certain disadvantages when utilized with a charger as it is therefore necessary to provide a charger of a specific construction to fit a radio-battery unit of a specific size. For instance, in such present day chargers, the charging contacts must be located in a fixed position in the charger for each specific combination of radio-battery length or a complex spring loaded arrangement must be provided for the charging contacts on the charger so that the charging contacts may be moved into a selected position with such a contact arrangement keyed to mate with the contact terminals on the battery so as to permit the movement of the charging contacts on the charger in accordance with the length of each radio-battery combination inserted in the charger.